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From the Associated Press

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) _ Highlights of the final $21.36 billion 2008-09 state spending plan given tentative approval Monday night by the North Carolina House and Senate. The monetary figures reflect adjustments to the second year of the two-year budget the Legislature approved last year.

SALARY AND BENEFITS

— Average 3 percent raise for public school teachers, community college and university professional staff; 2.69 percent raises for public school principals and assistant principals; the greater of 2.75 percent or $1,100: $368.3 million.

— Signing bonuses for new registered nurses at state mental hospital and other facilities: $500,000.

— 2.2 percent cost-of-living raises for state retirees: $30.2 million.

PUBLIC SCHOOLS

— Revise teacher salaries for coming year based on actual data: -$43.6 million.

— Cover higher prices for school bus diesel fuel: $35 million.

— Replace 160 fewer school buses next year: -$4.5 million.

— Increase funds for children with disabilities: $6.2 million.

— Eliminate funds for standardized writing tests in grades 4, 7 and 10: -$3.3 million.

— Reduce funds for Learn and Earn online program to let students take college-level classes, reflecting actual expenditures: -$8.6 million.

— Reduce inflationary increase for textbooks, instructional supplies: -$1.4 million.

— ABC teacher performance bonuses: $90 million.

— Open 14 additional Learn and Earn high schools in fall, raising total to 56: $3.6 million.

— Expand funding for pilot program to provide laptops to students and teachers in eight schools: $1.5 million.

— Upgrade public school broadband connectivity: $10 million.

— Establish mentoring program for first- and second-year teachers: $3 million.

— Supplement funding for at-risk students and low-wealth school districts: $8.9 million.

— Increase per-student funding for academically gifted students: $3.2 million.

— Expand dropout prevention grant program: $15 million.

— Expand More at Four preschool initiative: $30 million.

UNIVERSITY SYSTEM

— Raise University of North Carolina system enrollment growth for additional 8,082 students this fall: $34.6 million.

— Reduce system budget, with system president and Board of Governors given flexibility to determine areas to cut: -$16 million.

— Expand EARN Scholars Program, which helps students in low-income families graduate from UNC system schools debt-free, to provide grants to students in private and independent colleges, but shift spending from general fund to escheats fund: -$43.8 million.

— Fund recommendations in University of North Carolina Campus Safety Task Report: $15 million.

— Implement plans for expansion of UNC-Chapel Hill and East Carolina University medical schools: $1.5 million.

— Add professional staff to plan and operate new East Carolina University dental school: $1.5 million.

— Help build a fire training tower at Fayetteville State University: $400,000.

— Operating funds for bioengineering program at North Carolina State University engineering school: $2 million.

— Replace equipment, provide operating funds for N.C. A&T State University engineering school: $2 million.

— Match private funds for Spangler distinguished professorships at all 16 system campuses: $4.6 million.

— Enhance academic, student services at N.C. Central University law school: $2 million.

— UNC system programs at North Carolina Research Campus in Kannapolis: $6 million.

— Grant to reimburse fire department for purchase of aerial fire truck to serve UNC-Pembroke: $200,000.

— Additional operating funds for nanoscience and engineering graduate school at N.C. A&T and UNC-Greensboro: $3 million.

— Expand UNC fund to recruit and retain top-notch faculty: $3 million.

— Continue funding UNC Research Competitiveness Fund to target emerging fields: $1 million.

— Fund new tuition waivers to recruit and retain top-notch graduate students in math and science: $1.5 million.

— Grant to build N.C. State University's Advanced Transportation Energy Center, which will research development of plug-in cars: $2.5 million.

COMMUNITY COLLEGES

— Meet projected increased enrollment of 6,455 students for 2008-09 school year: $23.8 million.

— Hire faculty, purchase equipment and supplies for allied health programs: $4 million.

— Hire faculty, purchase equipment and supplies for technical education programs: $1 million.

— Purchase instructional equipment at all 58 campuses: $5 million.

— Fund Rowan-Cabarrus Community College for operations at North Carolina Research Campus in Kannapolis: $1 million.

— Establish 17 minority male mentoring programs, continues 15 current programs: $985,000.

— Establish interactive 3-D center at Fayetteville Technical Community College to offer modeling, simulation training for military and civilian initiatives: $400,000.

— Support Motorsports Consortium: $500,000.

HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES

— Grants for health provider networks that provide free health care to poor and uninsured: $3.8 million.

— Grants for community health centers: $4 million.

— Support operations, maintenance for small rural hospitals: $2 million.

— Use federal block grants to reduce waiting lists for child-care subsidies by 1,110 children. No additional funds needed.

— Eliminate funding for Vision Care program: -$500,000.

— Funding for local Smart Start early childhood programs: $500,000.

— Create demonstration projects to reduce obesity, disease related to it: $2 million.

— Fund state quit-smoking telephone hot line: $500,000.

— Aid to local health departments: $4.8 million.

— Reduce Work First welfare cash assistance: -$10.2 million.

— Increase monthly rate for State/County Special Assistance for residents in rest homes: $2.9 million.

— Distribute funds to regional food banks: $1.5 million.

— Implement new reimbursement system for foster care families: $8.2 million.

— Reduce Medicaid forecast due to reworking of state-federal formula and increase in drug rebate collections: -$65.5 million.

— Reduce inflationary increases for reimbursements to medical providers for services to Medicaid patients: -$35.3 million.

— Cost savings from statewide chronic care management of aged, blind and disabled: -$29.4 million.

— Delay start of NC Kids' Care, which expands child health insurance coverage in families making up to three times poverty level, until July 1, 2009: -$7 million.

— Receive refunds from Community Support providers following reviews and audits: -$12.3 million.

— Reduce from 15 to eight the maximum number of hours a mental health patient can be served through the Community Support program: -$9.1 million.

— Tighten eligibility, change guidelines for cost-saving measures for Community Support program: -$65.1 million.

— Fund services to more developmentally disabled residents for in-home services through Community Alternatives Program: $6.7 million.

— Mental health screening for thousands of residents of adult care homes: $2.1 million.

— Increase Medicaid dental reimbursement rates to providers by 5 percent: $5 million.

— Expand NC Health Choice program to provide subsidized health insurance to 7,341 more children in families making up to twice the poverty level: $9.4 million.

— Subsidize 30 mobile crisis teams for mentally ill: $5.7 million.

— Assist with funding six crisis teams for developmentally disabled: $1.9 million.

— Pay for psychiatric bed space at local hospitals: $8.1 million.

— Create local walk-in clinics for crisis and immediate psychiatric care: $6.1 million.

— Hire 107 additional nurses, psychiatrists and other professionals at state mental hospitals: $7.3 million.

— Hire 19 more people at state medical facilities to improve training and supervision of staff: $1.9 million.

— Develop 60-bed overflow unit at Dorothea Dix Hospital during transition to new Central Regional Hospital, fill 97 positions: $5.2 million.

NATURAL AND ECONOMIC RESOURCES

— Create two food safety and security inspectors: $144,000.

— Purchase more agricultural conservation easements on farm and forest land: $4 million.

— Replace incinerator, buy two freezers for Rollins veterinary agriculture lab in Raleigh: $525,000.

— Create four new Department of Labor worker safety positions: $350,000.

— Operating efficiencies in several agencies within the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, including state aquariums and the NC Zoo: -$1.5 million.

— Evaluate coastal water quality from state ferry vessels: $384,000.

— Hire five employees, other expenses to update river basin water supply plans: $508,000.

— Establish oyster sanctuary program, being transferred to Division of Marine Fisheries: $2 million.

— Share cost with farmers hurt by the drought to restore damaged pastures and develop new water sources: $1.7 million.

— State matching funds for loan funds for clean water and drinking water projects: $8 million.

— Delay lease of Department of Commerce replacement aircraft: -$1.2 million.

— Open international trade office in China: $175,000.

— One North Carolina Fund and One North Carolina Small Business incentives funds: $8.5 million.

— North Carolina Green Business fund expansion: $1 million.

— Continue incentives to Johnson & Wales University for Charlotte campus: $1.5 million.

— Implement biofuels strategic plan at Biofuels Center of North Carolina: $5 million.

— Support Defense and Security Technology Accelerator business incubator in Fayetteville: $1.5 million.

— Fund e-NC Authority, which expands high-speed Internet to underserved areas: $1.5 million.

— Water and sewer grants and economic infrastructure fund, administered by North Carolina Rural Economic Development Center: $50 million.

— N.C. Biotechnology Center building, loan program expansion: $4 million.

— Water and sewer grants and economic infrastructure fund, administered by North Carolina Rural Economic Development Center: $50 million.

JUSTICE AND PUBLIC SAFETY

— Hire two new employees at N.C. Innocence Inquiry Commission: $140,000.

— Reduce courthouse telephone services and equipment, subject to passage on pending bill: -$3.4 million.

— N.C. State Bar legal assistance to low-income homeowners hurt by predatory lending: $200,000.

— Restore funds for N.C. Conference of District Attorneys, Clerks of Superior Court Conference: $523,000.

— Hire three new assistant prosecutors: $311,000.

— Provide funding for three new District Court judges, staff: $338,000.

— Hire four deputy clerks of court: $156,000.

— Hire 10 new magistrates: $335,000.

— Privately assigned counsel for indigent defense services: $1.1 million.

— Eliminate expansion of public defender offices and attorney positions around state: -$1.6 million.

— Reduce expenses within the Department of Juvenile Justice & Delinquency Prevention: -$765,000.

— Hire nine psychiatrists, 20 staff employees at juvenile detention centers: $689,000.

— Restore funding to Juvenile Crime Prevention Councils: $22.7 million.

— Create 50-bed substance abuse treatment program for female parolees and probationers: $1.9 million.

— Establish reserve fund to hire probation and parole field staff: $2.5 million.

— Restore Criminal Justice Partnership Program funding: $9.2 million.

— Reduce expenses within Department of Correction, such as for energy and equipment: -$2.6 million.

— Reduce Department of Correction medical spending, increase recoupments: -$11.8 million.

— Give money to N.C. Sheriffs' Association for technical assistance and training to county sheriffs associated with immigration enforcement: $600,000.

— Pay insurance copays or 100 percent for uninsured rape victims for the expense of forensic exams: $1.1 million.

OTHER GOVERNMENT AGENCIES

— Sexual Assault and Rape Crisis Center funding: $1 million.

— Additional money for scholarships for children of veterans killed or disabled during wartime: $327,000.

— International Civil Rights Museum: $500,000.

— Aid to public libraries: $1 million.

— North Carolina Symphony: $450,000.

— Matching funds to build John Coltrane Music Hall in High Point: $75,000.

— Operating, staff reductions within Department of Cultural Resources: -$697,000.

— Expand Home Protection Program to all 100 counties: $3 million.

— Finance housing for people with disabilities: $7 million.

— Construct North Carolina State Veterans Park in Fayetteville: $15 million.

— Reserve to provide recreational activities and raise morale at military installations: $1 million.

— Hire six new positions, raise salaries for two more within State Treasurer's investment management division: $764,000.

TRANSPORTATION

— Repair and renovation Department of Transportation facilities statewide: $9.1 million.

— Reduce central administrative costs within DOT: -$12 million.

— Perform repaving, repair bridges and other activities to extend highway life: $24.5 million.

— Grants to short-line railroads: $1 million.

— Reduce funds for intrastate system road projects, urban loops and secondary road construction in keeping with new revenue estimates: -$64.8 million.

— Reduce $172 million annual transfer from Highway Trust Fund to general operating fund: $25 million.

— Gap funding to begin construction of Triangle Expressway toll road: -$25 million.

CAPITAL PROJECTS

— State Capital Visitors Center planning: $2.6 million.

— Planning for North Carolina Freedom Monument in Raleigh: $450,000.

— N.C. Zoo African Pavilion replacement planning: $600,000.

— Complete planning, site development at UNC-Chapel Hill Biomedical Research Imaging Center: $35 million.

— Other planning funds for UNC system campus construction: $53.1 million.

— Begin phase one of Carolina North campus at UNC-Chapel Hill: $11.5 million.

Also, the budget authorizes $857.5 million in debt over the next four years to add 1,500 prison beds and for university buildings and other construction projects.

RESERVES, OTHER CHANGES

— Job Development Investment Grants for economic development incentives: $15 million.

— Set aside funds to carry out pending anti-gang legislation: $10 million.

— Information technology improvements: $18.6 million.